Subroutine
by Atlantislux
Summary: Revenge is a dish best served cold.


_This story is set 23 years after the events of the series. __AU.  
_

**Subroutine**

The blonde Balalaika had been a quite good-looking woman when she was young and, even now, thanks to expensive beauty treatments, at almost seventy the left side of her face still retained something of the past beauty. However, the right side was still disfigured by an old war scar, that no plastic surgeon had been able to erase.

Rock smiled vaguely. _'Or maybe she didn't want to get rid to something that reminds her of her past on the battlefields.' _  
He didn't know. He had been the right-hand man of Balalaika since the Black Lagoon disbanding, but she never opened up to him. Or with anyone else, as far as he knew. Balalaika was living on the edge for almost forty years, always and completely alone. Even if during the years she had become the ultimate leader of the mafia organization known as the Hotel Moscow, taking Rock with her, the man she liked to call "my Japanese shadow".

Rock had never figured out what thoughts lingered inside her, who had never cast aside the role of the cold crime manager. In the same way, Rock failed to understand the man seated in front of them.  
Major David Meyer, of the US Army, was the contact who could give them the keys to Michael, a satellite armed with a microwave cannon able to hit enemies in every part of the world. Despite the fact it was still inactive, a client of Balalaika was ready to pay billions of dollars to have it and the woman did not want to miss that opportunity. All thing considered, it was difficult but also a matter of honour to snatch it from under the ass of the Pentagon, for the organization that, even before the Third World War broke out, had always been the main supplier of smuggled weapons for militias and rough countries.

Considering that he should have known in whose hands the satellite was going to end up, and against _which_ state it would probably been used Meyer, a decorated war hero, had decided to betray Uncle Sam, and Rock was anxious to know why.

He secretly smiled, eying once again the resume of the American. Because Rock had seen so many people like him, and it was amusing to try to figure out why people did something so ominous. Even if, whether they were selling their own children to paedophiles or top secret weapons, they did it just for money. And Rock was sure that the American had the same reasons, even if he appeared a bit more educated.  
Rock had bet with Balalaika and her men, as he did every time. Because business was a big deal, but they deserved too a bit of amusement.  
He heard the smooth voice of Meyer ask for a glass of mineral water, and Rock's attention returned to the man.

Thirty-three years old, a Master's degree in Engineering at MIT, the only son of a rich businessman deceased some years before, after graduation he joined the Army, and his career had been fast and successful._  
'So fast that at only thirty years old he took command of the frightened shock troopers who freed Jerusalem at the end of the war. The Al-Aqsa massacre is believed to be his operation. Strange, he doesn't have the appearance of a blood-thirsty beast.'  
_The Major, despite the birthdate on his ID card and the prematurely silver hair, looked many years younger, thanks to delicate features that would have humiliated any top-model.

'_I bet that with that face it wasn't easy in the beginning, was it? But from what I read here you quickly found the way to impress those fanatics.'  
_"Is it true what they say? That you were leading the assault corps during the capture of the Western Wall" Balalaika asked him.  
Meyer's lips twisted into a pale grin. "Sooner or later everyone wants to know about it."  
"Why not? You are famous. Not since the war in Chechnia had the world seen something like that. Or, more likely, it probably wasn't since the First Crusade that the streets of Jerusalem flooded with so much blood."  
Rock looked Balalaika confused, while the American burst into a dry laughter.  
"Great quote, _tovarish_ Captain" referring to the rank of Balalaika when she was still serving in the Soviet Army. "You are right, of course, but it seems that your accountant here didn't catch it."  
Eyes always locked on Meyer, Balalaika exhaled deeply from her cigar, taking a moment, or so it seemed to Rock, to weigh the man.  
"Rock, in 1099 when the Crusaders, after a Siege lasting one month, conquered Jerusalem, they burned the Synagogue over the heads of the Jewish defenders who had sought refuge there, killing everyone. Just like what the Mayor here did with the Palestinian terrorists and their families who thought that the Al-Aqsa walls could protect them."  
Mayer shook his shoulders, smiling more convincingly, and with a strange gleam in his eyes that Rock had seen many times during his career in the mafia. _'The fucking yuppie is a homicidal maniac' _he silently sentenced.  
"It was the best re-enactment ever" the American said happily. "Just like Raymond of Aguilers said 'the slaughter was so great that our men waded in blood up to their ankles'. And since they were clever enough to gather there, in the spot closest to Allah, we only helped them to reach him faster. Besides, now they are really worth of the name al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades."  
The Major giggled at his own joke and Rock felt his self control evaporate.

He firmly believed that the crime was _evil_ but clearly _clean_ and he couldn't stand those like the American, who slaughtered people in the name of an abstract concept of justice. It was the reason why, so many years before, he had abandoned that false and hypocritical world .  
"With phosphorous bombs? There were hundreds of children there, burnt alive" Rock sneered.  
The others seemed unimpressed. "So? We spared them a miserable life in the refugee camps. I've nothing to be ashamed of. And then we received the order to take the Western Wall intact and by any means. I would have gladly ground-bombed the mosque, it would have saved us the problem of cleaning up everything afterwards, but orders are orders."  
Meyer leaned forward, chin on his hand, staring at Balalaika with a curious expression, almost child-like. At that view Rock's teeth clenched tightly, and he had to take a deep breath, caught in the urge to rise to his feet and slap Meyer silly.  
_'Perfectly logical. Too bad that your resume makes apparent that you bosses were not too happy with your bravado. In fact they removed you from the front line to send you to direct a research project. Maybe you seemed less dangerous closed in a laboratory.' _

Clearly Balalaika seemed to think the same, as she nodded, while her lips twisted into a scary grin. "Meyer, let me tell you this: I like the smell of napalm in the morning, but hospitals and mosques have always been sacred to me. That is the difference between a soldier and a slaughterer. Anyway, these are old stories, let's get back to business. It took us months to settle on you, but when it happened we were a bit surprised. We didn't think you were so ready to handle us the leash of Michael. All things considered, it's the project you have personally supervised to keep your country safe."  
The Major smiled. "I'm not that sentimental. It's only a huge cannon mounted on a satellite instead of a tank. A weapon and nothing more. And I didn't join the army because I harboured feelings of loyalty towards my country, or I won't be here."  
_'No?' _Rock asked to himself.  
"From your background I assumed you were more of a patriot. None of your social class enlists if he isn't."  
Meyer got rid of Rock's objection with a light shrug. "I'll be honest with you. I did it only to learn how it felt to kill someone."  
_'And I bet you liked it, didn't you?'_

Rock leaned against the back of his chair, desperately trying not to shake his head._ 'The war fucked so many of these spoilt brats. He must have joined after a youth spent playing Doom, but while the others discovered that the war is not a videogame, this one has loved it. And he came back home totally psycho. I can see in his face. He looks all educated and crap but sometimes his expressions are worthy of Freddy Krueger.'  
_"Rock, shut up. And you Meyer, quit talking about this crap" Balalaika quietly said. "The important thing is that you bring the codes, I didn't buy you a business class ticket to listen how hot it was to smash Al-Quaeda guys jaws."  
_'That he did too'_ Rock mentally added. _'The handsome Major, beside his love for ground bombings, appears to have a soft spot for torture too. They still remember him in Abu-Garaib …'_  
Nodding, Meyer extracted a thin plastic card from one if his pockets. "Everything is in here. Blueprints of the project, access codes, and coordinates of the trial target."  
She looked at the card, without taking it, while the hacker of the Hotel Moscow materialized at her side. The man inserted the card into his pc, his fingers quickly dancing over the keyboard.  
"Good. After the test the money we promised you will be at your disposal at a local bank."  
"Wasn't it easier to credit them directly on a classified account?"  
"And wasn't it easier to send us that stuff?"  
The American raised both his hands against the retorting of Balalaika.  
"Sure. But I wanted to see the faces of Michael's new owner. You know, it's like a son to me."  
His reply was so stupid that the woman exhaled, sounding annoyed to a point that Rock had to suppress an ironic smirk. His gaze closed on the Major with renewed incertitude.  
_'Ok, he's clean. None has followed him and he isn't in contact with the secret service. And he made sure that the Pentagon didn't shoot down Michael before it was in our hands. A perfect job and, despite what Balalaika says it doesn't matter, the guy must have a hell of a reason to do this.' _  
The hacker extracted the card and dropped it on the table, signalling that everything was in order; a few seconds later Balalaika's mobile rang. She listened to the call, eyes fixed on Meyer. Then she barked a quick order in Russian. At that moment the American lowered his eyes, passing a hand through his hair and giving a muffled sigh. Balalaika ended the call.  
"Is it done?" he asked her.  
"Sure. Michael hit and destroyed the building of the society that developed him. My men checked all the exits and we are sure that none of your former co-workers got out."  
The man in front of her nodded seeming, for the first time, not at his ease. "Yeah, they are… were scientists who practically lived inside that building."  
"Aren't you sad for them, not even the slightest?" Rock asked.  
The other shook his shoulders. "Why? They were only co-workers. And, in any case, I'm perfectly aware of just how many friends the money you'll give me will buy me."  
"I thought that the money shouldn't be a problem for you. Your family wasn't poor."  
Meyer stared at him with a stare that painfully reminded Rock of Revy. "Are you kidding? Noone can be _too_ rich."  
With an ironic smile Rock looked away. Once he would have been scandalized by those words, but he had heard them from too many people.  
_'For a moment I thought you had a superior motivation to sell your life and your friends in this way. I don't know… the hate for your country, the jealousy over a co-worker who screwed your wife, old grudges… and instead you are the usual avaricious son of a bitch who's got everything and wants more. You are a huge delusion, Major. Besides, I won the bet, Balalaika.'  
_The woman seemed to have read in his mind, because she hastily stubbed out her cigar in the ashtray.  
"And you'll agree with me that we adequately paid for this toy, _yankee_. Rock, take him to the bank, and make sure he leaves on the first plane. It has been a pleasure to have a business partner like you, Major Meyer."  
The group stood up, and the American slightly inclined his head. "The same for me, even if I hoped to stay to play a bit with you."  
Rock furrowed his eyebrows. For some reason, what Meyer said sounded truly strange. But Balalaika didn't seem to find his words bizarre. Instead, her lips twisted in a sneer.  
"I'll take a look at you resume. Now that I think of it your skills could be useful to us."  
The sarcastic smile on Meyer's face confirmed to Rock that the Major wouldn't found it unpleasant to join the staff of the Hotel Moscow.

He wondered if Balalaika was kidding but, in case, Rock silently swore to do everything possible to change her mind. There were already too many psychotic former military in the ranks of the organization._  
_

--

Vladivostok's airport had seen better days. Five years earlier, during the war, the Russian Pacific Fleet had been destroyed, and the harbour heavily bombed; from that moment, the city began to rot, having lost it's main source of money. Now, the only ones who gathered at the airport were the only ones lucky enough to leave, and the mafia thugs and tycoons.

Quietly seated, waiting for the check in, Rock looked around, knowing too well the meaning of the scared glances he and his group were causing.  
_'Regular people seem to have a sixth sense for those like us. Must be the survival instinct. And we are too well dressed, when the only ones in town who can afford a Gucci coat are the Hotel Moscow employees and this guy.'_  
He shot a glance at the Major, who was silently seated close to him, with an unreadable look in his pale eyes.  
_'What the hell is he thinking, one who has just roasted his co-workers? Maybe an enjoyable way to spend the fucking money he just earned. Yeah, it's for sure like this…'  
_At that moment his cell phone rang. It was Balalaika. Rock replied swiftly, telling her that everything was fine, and that they were waiting for the yankee to be onboard to be on their way back. On the background Rock could hear the noisy chatting of Steve Connor, the hacker who followed her everywhere. The Japanese was still talking, when the line suddenly fell silent.  
Annoyed, Rock stared at the mobile. He waited few seconds for Balalaika to call back, than he dialled her number. But only a registered voice replied, notifying him that the other mobile was switched off.  
Silently cursing the failing repeaters of Vladivostok, he carelessly tucked the phone in his pocket.  
"What's the matter, this time? This city is totally falling apart…" the words left his lips before he could stop them.  
"It's a subroutine" surprising the American replied him.  
Rock turned towards the man, perplexed. "A what?"  
The other answered as if he was reading from a textbook. "It is a portion of code within a larger program, which performs a specific task or solves a particular problem."  
"I don't think I got it…"  
"Imagine it like something you have started in the past, that only today shows its effects. Anyway, it's not that important. Oh, I need the bathroom, who is going with me?"  
Rock smiled. _'You have see too many 007 movies. But me too, my friend.'_  
"Obviously all of us" he replied.  
They all stood up and walked towards the bathroom, while outside the distant screams of sirens pierced the air.

--

Rock looked at the mirror, taking care not to touch the filthy sink. He found himself not very different from twenty years before, when he had abandoned the so called _civil society_, only his belly had grown bigger and his hair thinner. _  
'I should go to the gym, but first I need to find the will to go… And then why? I'm an accountant, not a killer. To watch her back Balalaika has got all the men money can buy.' _

Like the Bulgarian guy who had followed them in the small room, who was so big that his shoulders almost touched the two opposite walls. To ask him to enter had been, maybe, an excess of zeal, but Rock didn't want to take the risk. The American wasn't armed but he was in perfect shape and, Rock was sure, trained to kill a man with his bare hands.  
He heard him, and he turned to watch. Meyer was tall and athletic, but he seemed almost frail compared to the Bulgarian. As if hypnotized, Rock stared at the Major as he passed close to the thug, shooting him a bizarre smile, one that turned his face into the one of a sneaky brat. Rock did not even have the time to ask himself where he had seen something like that before. Everything happened in the space of a breath.

The American passed something on the giant's throat, then launching it against Rock.  
A searing pain exploded in his upper thorax and Rock instinctively turned his head, but before he could do anything the cold metal of a gun pressed against his temple, stiffled the shout in his throat.  
"Open your mouth and that will be your last problem."  
Rock stiffened, fighting the fear and the pain. From under the clavicle emerged the card that he had seen pass between Meyer and Balalaika. _'It was on the table last time I saw it… when did he retrieve it?'  
_The unusual weapon had sunk in his pectoral muscle. And it burned like hell.  
Meyer's mocking voice came down to him. "Guessing what is? It's not plastic but ionized ceramic. Rubbing the edge is enough to make it as sharp as a blade."  
The Japanese found the strength to raise the head, even though every movement made the suffering worse. The Bulgarian thug was shrunken on the floor, soaked in his own blood that had pooled around him, seeping from the deep gash in his throat. Not a sound had escaped his lips. However, his gun was firmly aimed at Rock's head.

Swallowing, he looked at Meyer. "Don't even think to if you live."  
"Sure? I bet so, because you know, I'll be my human shield."  
"If in two minutes we don't appear from that door the guys have the order to assault the place."  
"Good. So we speak for those two minutes so you'll get a grip on yourself and you won't give me away later. I've no use for a collapsed shield."  
Another devious smile. Rock was starting to find them absolutely evil.  
"This has to do with what you said before, right?" he asked, forcing himself to speak despite the pain.  
"Sure. The subroutine was triggered in the moment your hacker copied the information from the card. As you know, every computer can be traced through the net, and exactly thirty minutes after the start of the subroutine the program triangulated the ground position of the pc, sending it to Michael."  
Rock gasped. "The satellite hit... here?"  
"Yeah" Meyer replied flatly. "Even if I'm positive that it was quite boring to see. No huge explosions or weird flashes of lights. The microwaves simply cooked everything within a diameter of half of a mile from the target."

"Fool. Balalaika cannot be dead. She survived hundreds of attacks to her life, even more imaginative than this one.  
"I know, but I don't care. In the end taking her life was only a bonus for me, while your hacker was the real target."  
"What?"  
"Why not? He was the asshole who cracked the Pentagon mainframe, allowing the Pasdaran to get the nuclear missiles they wanted so bad. You can be sure that Uncle Sam doesn't like it when his toys are used on his own cities."  
"And did they organize all of this just to get that guy?"  
Meyer shrugged. "Nothing was considered too much, for the sake of fucking one of the most wanted criminals on Earth. It was too dangerous to leave him alive, especially after he was hired by you."  
"And for that… you really let us kill those scientists?"  
"They had already completed their work, and they were of no more use for us. And don't be that shocked, we have done worse things to put annoying bastards like Steve Connor six feet under."  
Rock tried to smile. "CIA? NSA? Are you the dog of what?"  
"None of those. My employer is an agency less compromised at a political level and subsequently more free to move."  
"Since many years ago, I bet."  
"Recruited on the battlefield. I struck them favourably with my interrogation techniques." This time, a sadistic glee lit up Meyer's eyes. And in Rock's mind the fear washed away the pain. From what he had read about the Major, he was not exactly eager to know more about those _techniques_.

"You are totally nuts. You need a good psychiatrist. A good one" Rock growled, trying to control the urge to tremble. The Major was not only scary, but inspiring a primal kind of fear.  
The American laughed, looking sincerely amused. "I've already met the best ones. The first one was so boring that I ripped her eyes out, the second one I pinned all of his Mont Blancs, but the third one told me that if I really wanted to return to do what I liked the most I had to be, from that moment on, a proper and obedient good boy. And so I did."  
Rock's brain short-circuited, as he realized abruptly that he had seen those eyes somewhere before. And the deep pit of depravity that lingered inside.  
"That's insane. What does it fucking mean to return to do what you like?"  
And _insane_, it was clearly a word that amused Meyer to no end. He smiled gingerly. "To play with people. Even if I had to wait till the war. But then it was so funny. And sometimes, while I was working on those pigs, it seemed to me that my sister was there with me."  
Rock felt the blood drain from his face, while finally all the weird things that Meyer had said, and his bizarre behaviour, made a devastating sense. His hands grabbed the sink, or he would have collapsed to the floor.

"Hansel…?" he asked, tentatively. "But you died that night... Balalaika told us so."  
He stared at the Major, finding a bit hard to recognize, in that adult face, the angelic features of the siblings he had so badly wanted to forget. _'It's ridiculous. If I hadn't did it, maybe I'd found out before who he really was.'  
_The American – not so much, by now – raised his left hand, now free from the glove that he had worn during the encounter with Balalaika.  
An old, vast scar disfigured the back. The trace of something traumatic that disappeared along the wrist.  
"The bullet of that sniper almost disintegrated it, and your precious Balalaika remained there, to watch me bleed to die in the park. Then they wrapped me in a garbage bag and they threw me away, so eager to get rid of me that they didn't even check if I was completely dead. The fishermen who found me fixed me enough to sell me to the next-in line paedophile tourist. Isn't it ironic? So much for coming back from where I started."  
The pressure of the gun on Rock's head relieved just a little bit, but the look in Hansel's eyes remained icy. "I've been lucky that the old fart felt sorry for me before something else. He took me with him to the US, healing me and adopting me legally, erasing my past life."  
Rock shook his head. "He should have wasted a lot of bucks in your therapy" he said with sad irony.  
"Affirmative. But I was only ten, and children forget soon at that age. I assure you that I'm perfectly sane, or in this moment you'd be crawling on the floor with your bowels as a necklace."  
"Look, I talked to your sister, and I saw what they did to her." Even after so many years, the revulsion for what Gretel conceived under her skirt, made him feel positively sick. His eyes squinted as if against some pungent smell. "I highly doubt that someone, even young, could even recover from something like that."  
He reply emotionless. "What that has to do with me? She has always been too soft. And the only thing she kept dreaming was the sea. Can you see how fucked up she was?"

The words were almost innocent and slightly incoherent, but they finally made Rock realize the magnitude of the crap he was in. The Japanese swallowed hard, because the glee in Meyer's eyes spoke volumes.  
_'He's not crazy in that unruly way, but he's far from sane. He just learned another way to enjoy himself with the protection of the law. Should I be surprised? Not really. I learnt the hard way that in a rotten world like this, someone like him is always needed when the shit hits the fan.' _  
Rock dared to stare into the eyes of the Major, determined like those of an hunting wolf. _'Cool, I'm in the hands of a State Psychopath.'_

Meyer smiled. "Sorry, but our time is running out. In few minutes your friends will come to see if you are still alive. So, now we are going to leave this place, and you'll do everything to stay alive, ok, Jap?"  
"If news of Balalaika reached them we'll be dead the very nanosecond we get out."  
"Maybe… or maybe not. And we've only to reach an airplane to flee the country. The Russian won't follow us in Northern Korea."  
"Only? Your brain is not yet working properly if you think that this plan will keep us alive and with all our limbs intact."  
"I've nothing to lose, and neither do you. But here is your cookie. I'll try to save your ass, since my sister promised you something I have to keep."  
Confused, Rock tilted his head to the side. "Which promise?"  
"Your friend Benny told me that during her last trip you were kind to my sister. Oh, don't make that face, I didn't cut his throat, just some extremities, but I promised him that his adorable family would be his dinner if he alerted you. Anyway, he told me everything. Even the words that you exchanged with my sister, before her head exploded."

Instinctively Rock tried to step back, but he was trapped between the killer and the basin. "And so, what?" he managed to whisper.  
Meyer lowered his head, his lips almost touching Rock's hear while the barrel of the gun wedged into his jaw. Disgust shook the Japanese man, paralyzing his limbs. Then the killer spoke, trying to do his best to imitate a little child tone.  
"Now give a me a nice cry, so we'll be rid of all of those evil people." The voice switched abruptly into that of a girl. "And then we'll have lunch together, just the two of us."  
Despite the pain, Rock found extremely easy to scream at the top of his lungs.

_The End_

_Before our innocence was lost,  
You were always one of those,  
Blessed with lucky sevens,  
And the voice that made me cry.  
_

_ Placebo, "Song to say goodbye"_


End file.
